Uppity swines and the mega-rich

Napoli president Aurelio De Laurentiis during training at PSG, obviously.
Photograph: Etienne Laurent/EPA

STAR STAR CRAZY

Back in 1987, when The Fiver did not exist and was at its funniest, Napoli ventured into Big Cup with the best player in the world, Diego Maradona, and their ambition as high as he often was. But the draw was open in those days and Napoli were pitted against Real Madrid in the first round. They lost and found themselves skulking off in a huff while unheard-of outfits such as AGF Aarhus, Gornik Zabrze and the Pope’s O’Rangers strode through to the second round.

That was a fiasco, as far as the rich and powerful were concerned, and aggravated by the fact that the eventual winners of that year’s tournament, PSV, came from the Netherlands, wherever that is. And this after the two previous editions had been won by teams from Portugal and Romania! Clearly something had to be done to tilt the playing field. Within a few years Uefa had introduced a properly gerrymandered Big Cup, but not before pesky Red Star Belgrade won the 1991 edition, the uppity swines. They and their like were sorted out a short time later, however, and there followed a long spell in the wilderness compounded by a heady assortment of factors. This season, after an absence of 26 years, Red Star returned at last to Big Cup but in a sorry state.

For a start, due to an impromptu fireworks display on an Austrian pitch after their victory in the preliminary round, Red Star fans are banned from attending Wednesday’s joust at Anfield, which is a shame for any of them who were hoping to witness another exhibition of cutting-edge mime by Xherdan Shaqiri. On the other hand, bearing in mind their last Big Cup away-day yielded a 6-1 clobbering at PSG, perhaps everyone who supports Red Star would prefer to avert their eyes from this one out of fear – except maybe those who have strictly no formal connection whatsoever to the club and happen to have placed a bet on how heavy that defeat might be [allegedly – Fiver Lawyers].

Meanwhile, in the same group, PSG play host to Napoli, whose owner, Aurelio De Laurentiis, thinks it’s high time the likes of Red Star, AGF Aarhus and the Pope’s O’Rangers were squeezed out again. “Why is Europe not working?” hollered De Laurentiis without any intention of listening to anyone’s answer other than this own. “It should be England, France, Italy, Germany and Spain – and that’s all,” he continued in an interview with Le Parisien. “The same for football. If you replaced Big Cup with a championship for five countries, including the top four from each one, you’d have 20 teams … On Tuesdays, Wednesday and Thursdays, you’d play this new competition, while at the weekend domestic championships would be played.”

Not that De Laurentiis wants football to be run exclusively for the mega-rich. In fact, he said he found PSG’s purchase of Neymar to be “pathetic and vulgar”. So just imagine what he thinks of the club who, according to Marco Verratti’s then-Mr 15% (Donato Di Campi), once made a “monstrous offer” in an attempt to prise the Italian midfielder from PSG. Which club was that? Oh Aurelio, how could you!

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